Yeah, I should have put "leaders" in quotes. I'm talking about those who are in a position to be leaders and should be leaders but are not. Right. Not all regulations are equal, there are regulations and regulations. Some are legit, some are cumbersome and made by bureaucrats who don't understand the real issues. Sometimes even "bad" regulations can be good, if they make it difficult for developers to overdevelop. But if we pick and choose which regulations to remove in the right situation, we can make a low income project more atractive to an investor/developer than another alternative proyect less friendly to the needy that he might be considering. And time is money, so fastracking a low income proyect will also make it more attractive to an investor or developer than the less low-income-friendly proyect he might be considering. That's where real leaders can get creative in how they manage incentives to get those who have the money to do what they want them to do. Yes, I acknowledge that this falsehood is out there. But here we are presumably interchanging ideas with more intelligent people, so we can skip those types of falsehoods.
they already do with things like LIHTC, NMTC, opportunity zones, etc. That’s at the very low end and developers and lenders do make use of it. But it’s not enough. NYT Upshot did a podcast on the general affordability crisis. Their big takeaway is that the home building industry never really recovered from the housing crisis. We aren’t building as many homes per year post crisis as we did in the 20 years prior. Population growth has tapered a bit overall, but we have also aged, which means more adults requiring homes to offset that and more people living alone. Other things like where people want to live and private investors buying up homes, fixing and renting out at steep prices enter into the equation as well. But overall current is dictated by fewer units being built post crisis.
Another reason I’ve heard are zoning restrictions mandating larger houses on larger lots. One of the biggest boons to building in cities has been easing or getting rid of parking requirements.
Another 25 point cut by the Fed. Powell just asked if new administration asked him to resign, would he do so? “No”. Then asked if he felt he could be legally asked to resign? “No”. Inflation and job numbers are good. Housing services as component of inflation is the most elevated. New rental leases signed are showing reductions. As existing leases expire over next couple of years and renewed, expect to see this component come more in line with inflation goals. Working with current data and no comment on fiscal policy current or future. They just model what is in place.
Also noted markets have trimmed expectations on future rate cuts. They are expecting inflation to tick back up limiting the room the fed has to cut.
Yes. I heard that bond yields ticked up. Probably due to Trump's stupid blanket tariff ideals which could lead to tariff wars. I think it's a bit obvious he is going to butt head with the Fed.
I think it's guaranteed he has a public temper tantrum at Powell, like last time. It's probably 50/50 if he fires him. The instability of the next 4 years will be intense. People really really don't quite grasp what they've done. We already have our list of counter tariffs prepared here in Canada. One of our largest Trump cards here is probably Uranium supplies. You need that in the US, we have lots and you don't (to my knowledge). This could get ugly for all of us.
"No", "no", "not permitted under the law", "not permitted under the law" That's the most entertaining Fed chair press conference I've ever watched. Next year should be fun.
I suspect that some powerfull business interests are going to have a chat with their friend Donald Trump and try to persuade him to go easy with some of the tariffs. I don't know to what extent he will listen to them, but Trump talks a lot and doesn't always follow through, and my expectation is that he will use tariffs mostly as he used them last time, primarily as a threat, and irrationally to "punish" countries he doesn't like. Watch out China and Mexico! Caveat, with somebody like Trump you never know.
Targeted tariffs are OK. Specially if it's used as leverage for negotiations. And that's what I hope is going to go down.
Yeah, if they are strategically planned and negotiated rationally. If you don't stop sending people across the border we'll slap some big tariffs on you is not rational.